On August 12, therefore, the representatives of Spain and France delivered to John, the Prince-Regent of Portugal (his mother, Queen Maria, was insane), almost identical notes, in which they declared that they should ask for their passports and leave Lisbon, unless by the first of September the Regent had declared war on England, joined his fleet to that of the allied powers, confiscated all British goods in his harbours, and arrested all British subjects within the bounds of his kingdom. The prince, a timid and incapable person, whose only wish was to preserve his neutrality, answered that he was ready to break off diplomatic relations with England, and to close his ports against British ships, but that the seizure of the persons and property of the British merchants, without any previous declaration of war, would be contrary to the rules of international law and morality. For a moment he hoped that this half-measure would satisfy Napoleon, that he might submit to the Continental System without actually being compelled to declare war on Great Britain. But when dispatches had been interchanged between the French minister Rayneval and his master at Paris, the answer came that the Regent’s offer was insufficient, and that the representatives of France and Spain were ordered to quit Lisbon at once. This they did on September 30, but without issuing any formal declaration of war. On October 18, the French army, which had been concentrating at Bayonne since the beginning of August, under the harmless name of the ‘Corps of Observation of the Gironde,’ crossed the Bidassoa at Irun and entered Spain. It had been placed under the orders of Junot, one of Napoleon’s most active and vigorous officers, but not a great strategist after the style of Masséna, Soult, or Davoust. He was a good fighting-man, but a mediocre general. The reason that he received the appointment was that he had already some knowledge of Portugal, from having held the post of ambassador at Lisbon in 1805. He had been promised a duchy and a marshal’s bâton if his mission was carried out to his master’s complete satisfaction.